‘The Good Wife’ Recap: Season 5, Episode 21 ‘The One Percent’

This week’s “The Good Wife” starts as any other Mother’s Day does, with brunch. Specifically someone making a lovely custard pie.

There’s a meeting of The Paisley Group. They are planning on merging with another company and firing 20 percent of their workforce. They are also being sued by the former CFO, who claims he was fired because he was gay. Alicia is their lawyer and says the guy was fired for selling trade secrets.

The pie ends up on Tom Skerritt’s face. He’s the head of the company- James Paisley. The person representing the alleged discriminated employee is Louis Canning (Michael J. Fox) from Lockhart/Gardner.

Politics: The report investigating Will’s shooting clears Finn. Eli is very, very happy. He worries about Finn’s sister’s drug overdose and his ex-wife’s miscarriage. Castro meets with Peter. He gives Peter a picture of Finn coming out of Alicia’s apartment building recently. Castro says it won’t look good if Peter endorses his wife’s lover. Peter then throws a glass of water in Castro’s face. I’m surprised Castro didn’t get Mr. Big’s fist in his face.

Eli tells Peter that Alicia convinced Finn to run. That doesn’t go over well. Peter now wants to hold off on endorsing Finn. Eli doesn’t know what’s going on. Now Peter is flirting with interns. Eli bans the intern from looking at the governor. Peter gets mad about that.

Eli asks Alicia what’s going on between the couple. She says she’s just tired and done. She says they’re not getting divorced but Peter can do what he wants as long as the kids don’t find out. Eli says she loves Peter and Peter loves her.

He goes back to Peter and sees the photo of Finn leaving the building. Eli then goes back to Alicia and she tells him to go to hell. Alicia figures out that it was Castro who showed the photo to Peter.

Alicia tells Eli she didn’t sleep with Finn. Eli returns to Peter and tells him. This must be exhausting for Eli. At the very end of the show, the intern knocks on the door and asks if Peter needs anything else. Oy.

Case: Alicia says they can pay $140,000 to make the gay discrimination suit go away. Paisley likes Alicia because she doesn’t take life too seriously. He says to pay the guy off.

Then Paisley goes on TV and complains about the protesters outside. He says he felt trapped in his boardroom like Anne Frank. He then says the 1 percent are hunted like the Jews in Nazi Germany. Louis is watching the interview too. Now it’s about the jury selection and he ups the money from $140,000 to $3 million.

Alicia wants Paisley to apologize for his comment. He says no at first and then met with a Holocaust survivor and changed his mind. So Paisley apologizes but then says Greeks and Italians reward the lazy and he won’t do that. So much for Greeks or Italians on the jury.

She’s trying to calm Paisley down, but it’s not working much. He’s quoting Ayn Rand. Alicia says they are losing jury members and his board members are getting nervous and thinking about backing out of the merger.

Paisley then issues a statement that’s been approved by a focus group. Alicia is then on TV and keeps confusing the two black anchormen who are interviewing her because she doesn’t have a monitor and can’t see who is talking. So now she looks like a racist.

Back in court, Alicia/Cary and Louis agree on $1 million agreement.

L/G – Louis is butting in on Diane’s case which is a class action suit, and then rushed off. Diane asks Kalinda to investigate. Kalinda tells Louis to just tell her. Louis says they can’t represent both the company and the people suing them.

Diane wants to represent the people whose kids were poisoned. Louis wants to represent the company that poisoned the kids. (Allegedly!)

She wants David Lee on her side. But then Rayna the rainmaker client bails because she has concerns about Diane, that she’s losing clients and stepping away from the firm. Diane says this isn’t true and where did she hear these horrible things?

Diane then stomps into Florrick/Agos and accuses them of spreading lies about her and her firm. But they never met with the rainmaker. It turns out Rayna the rainmaker got a call from Canning and she left. Canning is poisoning his own firm to get votes. Diane is furious!

Personal: Zac is graduating and Alicia is all giddy about it, demanding a picture in the cap and gown. Kalinda is still sleeping with Cary.

MIA: Nathan Lane, Diane’s husband, the kooky attorney with red hair. Daniel the guy Alicia was flirting with last week. Eli is never getting another date with America. Does anyone know where Zac is going to college?

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